I see in today’s Oban Times that the ‘War Chest’ fund – which is essentially public money – will be used in part to fund ‘a portal website’ . Is this a sensible investment when so much public money has already been poured into the VisitScotland website, and will the project be put out to tender or is the deal already sewn up I wonder?

I note from the same Oban Times article that another use of these public funds is to be ‘familiarisation trips for industry figures’. Sounds a little like jollies for the boys at the tax-and-ratepayers’ expense to me.

Scots Renewables also commented

That’s all good news Mike. I note that the existing website was created by a Glasgow-based company. It would be good if the new portal was created by an Argyll-based business – there are, after all, more than a few web design businesses in Argyll.

Will there be any way of measuring or quantifying the financial return from the website?

Re. your concerns about staff training – I think you will find that staff require retraining whenever a new vessel is brought into service . . . each boat is different.

And please do stop all this ‘we hear rumours’ rubbish. No-one believes you. Come up with facts and their sources like a real journalist or stop smearing doom and gloom. Less fuel is less fuel. And the new ferries are also designed to have lower maintenance costs.

Now, here’s some more potential good news on the ship technology front for Scotland . . . CMAL has been commissioned to carry out a feasibility study for Scottish Enterprise to evaluate the technical and commercial possibilities of using hydrogen fuel cells to power zero emission ferries. If this goes ahead it could put Scotland at the forefront of another new technology, with the consequent design, development and manufacturing of hybrid engines being located here. Great news – though I expect ForArgyll will want to talk it down.

Strangely enough specific mobile versions of websites (as opposed to apps – which are here to stay) may be a relatively short-lived phenomenon. As bandwidth on phones increases dramatically and most displays become HD 1024 pixels wide or more so standard websites become more and more useable. I don’t come across many that don’t display well on the iPad.

A mobile version was far more essential on older 320 pixel devices like Nokias, but these will die out. The non-mobile version of this site (for example) is quite useable on a new smartphone once it is rotated horizontally.

Apps that do specific things on mobile devices are another matter – they are definitly here to stay. And for blog sites like this the mobile version definitley increases useability (but see below).

Some feedback – I couldn’t view the comments on the mobile version, but I was using an emulator rather than an actual smartphone. Can other people view and post comments OK on the new mobile site using an iPhone or Andriod phone?